Existence
by Kay Kylo
Summary: One-shot. It's the new moon, sunset, and a shard is coming upon the gang with the intent of destroying. When it turns out to be a youkai asking for Kagome to be her brother's mate, what will Kagome choose?


Existence  
  
One-shot inspired by "Existence" by Kevin Max.  
  
Need I say more? Okay, so this was started as a song fic, but I gave it up and now it is simply a one-shot inspired by the song. This is a strange fic, I will say. It's a romance, obviously, but maybe it's suspense as a second genre. Or maybe it's general. Who knows? I certainly don't know. Ah, just read it. Decide for yourself what the second genre is.  
  
If you even bothered to read that, I'm proud of you. Read on.  
  
DO NOT OWN INUYASHA.  
  
Warnings: Um, little different. Just so that you know. Not much else.  
  
____________________________________________________________________  
  
Walking. Always walking. On and on, step after step. She just had to put one foot in front of the other, to keep from falling over.  
  
Kagome was tired.  
  
They had been wandering after a moving shard for weeks now, and it showed no attempt to stop or come to them. Except for now. Now it was heading for them with a speed that frightened her. What scared her most of all was that it was sunset, and it was the new moon.  
  
Sango and Miroku had been preparing for a battle on their own, but it was known that they would not get anything without Inuyasha. Who would be a human, and useless in his mind. He would go hide, leaving them to fend for themselves.  
  
Yet another new moon.  
  
So now, they were going away from the shard. After weeks of tracking, they were now running from it. They were trying to put as much space in-between them and the youkai as possible before the night came.  
  
Already, Kagome could see the silver hair that made Inuyasha obvious to the eye starting to fade to the black color that was common of his human heritage. He was getting agitated; she could see that as well. He would have to leave his precious shard detector for the night in the possible grips of a youkai.  
  
Why it bothered him tonight was an answer unknown. Every other new moon he left them, and the shards were a youkai magnet. If he ever left her, she was in the possible grips of a youkai. And the nights he went to Kikyo. He left them in the possible grips of a youkai.  
  
Slowly, Kagome was starting to see that the world was not all fluff and pink bunnies as it seemed to be at home. Sure, there were money troubles and school homework, but for many people, life was a constant battle. Hers was just a life filled with annoyances.  
  
Some people had to fight to sleep somewhere. Some people had to scrimp and save to buy a slice of bread. Some people never do live happily ever after with their beloved.  
  
Death happens. Enemies happen. Evil happens. And there is nothing anyone can do about it.  
  
There were Miroku and Sango. Miroku refused to acknowledge Sango's love for him for a simple reason: he might not live to be a husband for her, and to be a husband now meant almost certain death for her. He would despise that for obvious reasons. And Sango, she was just willing to wait.  
  
There was Inuyasha and Kikyo. They had something, and then Naraku destroyed it. The trust they had in each other was destroyed, now leaving only hatred. They now found something else, but it was not perfect.  
  
And then, there was Inuyasha and herself. She loved him, he hated her; it was a vicious circle. He thought nothing of her, she thought the world of him. He considered her a pest, she considered him a jerk that was simply loveable. He refused to trust her, she trusted him with all she had in her.  
  
Yes, all was not fluff and pink bunnies.  
  
Sango watched her friend's thoughts spiral around her eyes. She pined for her friend's happiness, but she knew the object of her happiness would not come to her.  
  
Though Inuyasha would not see it any time soon, Kagome was sad. Depressed, and sinking lower. When he spoke to her, she would flash him a bright, fake smile, and that would be it. He would take it and nothing would come of it.  
  
But what saddened her more was her friend's obvious dream. She dreamed, imagined, hoped that a fantasy would be true. But she was holding onto it with all her might though the world and the one the fantasy was about were trying to rip it from her arms.  
  
And all the while, Sango admired and dreaded her friend. She admired that her friend would hold so tight, but she dreaded the time when it would finally be ripped from her arms. Would Kagome fall into a deeper depression or would she break out of it to recover and be the Kagome Sango knew and loved?  
  
Kagome slowly gathered sticks for a fire as Inuyasha found a suitable place to build one. He was fully human now, and itching to leave. Why he did not Kagome did not know. She and Miroku and Sango knew how to make a camp. They had been through it several times at least.  
  
The stars were beautiful at this time of night, and the shard was still a good distance off. Kagome laid the sticks in a pyramid shape and lit the kindling to start the burning. Once the fire was lit, she started boiling the water necessary to make the soup she was planning for a dinner before she checked the shard and then started on her homework.  
  
This time, she had brought a flashlight. After explaining the mystery of it to a mystified Miroku, Sango, and Shippou, she started on the geometry problems.  
  
The same old, same old. Was this all she was good for? Homework, explaining the future devices, making camp, and checking the shards? That's what it seemed to her. That was all Inuyasha kept her around for. It was the only reason she had come to the past.  
  
The night passed fearfully, but nothing happened, luckily. There was a fearful point when Kagome did not feel anything from the shard, but it had reappeared after a while, farther from them.  
  
But through the whole night, she thought of death. What it would feel like, if it would hurt or would simply be a feeling. How her family would react, how her friends would react, how her death would shape the world.  
  
If she died, would the future be changed? Or would it be the same, simply because she was fated to die? Surely this had already happened, and she was just doing over something that happened before she was born. So what was she doing? She was playing out something that had already happened for the first time.  
  
It made her head hurt and Kagome quickly stopped considering the physics of time travel.  
  
The next morning, she got up, covered the fire, broke the camp, and they walked on, searching for the shard they had been tracking.  
  
It was not there, and Inuyasha got mad at her for not following it.  
  
She got angry back and sat him, and it ended up in not speaking to each other for the rest of the day.  
  
Yep, the same old, same old.  
  
A month passed, but Kagome never got the answers she was searching for. Until she sensed a strange shard. One that she recognized, but she kept that information secret. If that shard came closer, Inuyasha would sense it. And he could take care of it.  
  
If it came.  
  
As if it knew she knew it was there, the shard never came too close. It danced around them, following them or leading them, but never more than a glimmer on the horizon.  
  
Until the night of the new moon. As before, it suddenly and fearfully came at them with a speed that scared Kagome witless, and she was quick to relate the news. This in turn made Inuyasha mad that she did not tell them right away, and they got into a shouting contest again.  
  
As with last time, he was slow to leave the camp, but left anyway. In the grips of a possible youkai.  
  
But this time, she would not let him go off alone.  
  
Inuyasha was seated in his tree, or the tree he had staked out for the evening, safe from any little youkai. As a human, he was incredibly vulnerable, and he would not be anywhere near those other humans. Never, not when he was trouble, for their sakes, and not when they were trouble, for his sake.  
  
The night slowly became darker and the night quieter as his senses dulled. He hated this feeling of vulnerability that came with the transformation.  
  
"Inuyasha?"  
  
Inuyasha stiffened, fear coursing through his veins. Why in the world would she dare come out of the camp and into the woods? Especially with that shard so close.  
  
With a snarl, he jumped from the tree and landed unsteadily on his feet, glaring into Kagome's startled brown eyes. Beautiful eyes. He would not begrudge her that. Her eyes were similar to Kikyo, but they were entirely her own. He knew now that they were two different people. Her soul was not even the same. At one time, it may have been the same, but now, it was not. But if she cared for him . . . he did not believe so. She was too angry with him all the time.  
  
But did it matter? He loved Kikyo.  
  
Yeah, that's right. He loved Kikyo.  
  
"What are you doing here?"  
  
"I don't want you to be all alone tonight."  
  
Inuyasha felt his heart rate quicken at her statement, but he suppressed it quickly. "I don't need you."  
  
"I know that," she snarled, and Inuyasha was taken aback. "You think I don't know it? All the time when you just left us to face a youkai on our own, or left me to be with Kikyo, you don't think I wouldn't notice you don't need me?"  
  
Inuyasha was about to answer, and Kagome was about to cut him off, when a sharp, echoing chuckle sounded around them. Inuyasha instinctively drew Tetsuaiga, but it was just a rusted sword without his youkai blood.  
  
The chuckle deepened into a laugh and then, out of the trees, came a youkai, a shard implanted in her forehead.  
  
She was dressed similarly to Inuyasha, and looked much like him, except she had what could only be described as a dark mane about her head, reaching like side burns down her face and falling about her head in messy locks. Behind her head flowed white hair in long, straight strands. The onyx- colored ears were hidden in her mane and were twitching violently about her head, as if she suspected unwelcome visitors.  
  
"I do not know what to think of you."  
  
Her speech was deep and flowing, slightly entrancing, but Kagome shook herself free of it. Inuyasha only snarled and tried to look menacing as a human. Kagome could not help but notice he did better as a hanyou.  
  
"Is that all you want?" Kagome asked, hiding behind Inuyasha's larger form. The youkai turned her attention to Kagome with a slightly smile.  
  
"No. I am here to collect the mate my brother wishes. I agree. A miko in our blood would help, not harm us. Will you leave this unfaithful mate of yours or will you continue to die by him?"  
  
Inuyasha lowered his sword, obviously confused as Kagome felt her body shake.  
  
"He is not my mate."  
  
"Oh, then you will have no complaints to leaving."  
  
"But I do," Kagome snapped, rigid in fury. "I do not think I am a thing to be possessed, and I will not leave my friends."  
  
"The humans by the fire?"  
  
"Did you hurt them?" Kagome asked accusingly. The youkai chuckled and showed pure white teeth in a grin.  
  
"Of course not. They were the only loyal ones to you. But while you brought up this topic, how is the kitsune related to you? He is scented of you as if you were his own."  
  
"He's my . . . pup," Kagome murmured hesitantly. "Adopted, but mine."  
  
The youkai raised an eyebrow and then grinned. "He will come with. Would you prefer dying with a mate who wishes you or will you die with a hanyou who cares not for you?"  
  
Kagome suddenly paused. It was not a question of this unknown and Inuyasha. It was of anyone or Inuyasha. Miroku or Inuyasha. Hojo or Inuyasha. Someone in her near-distant future or Inuyasha.  
  
Inuyasha seemed to sense her choices and quickly pulled her to him, a possessive snarl coming from his lips. "She's not leaving."  
  
The youkai smirked. "You, hanyou, have little to say in this. It is, after all, her choice. This is the point when all that you have done and not done, said and not said, come back to haunt you."  
  
Horror seemed to spread over his features and Kagome pulled out of his grip. The look on his face nearly made her cry. He looked like she had already agreed to leave him to go to some unknown youkai who desired her power, not her. "Inuyasha . . . " she murmured and crouched down next to him, a hand outstretched to touch his cheek. He turned away from her and she felt a pang of hurt run through her.  
  
"You'd be safer with them anyway."  
  
Kagome hardened her heart at that and stood up. Without a word, she followed the youkai from the clearing.  
  
A suitable distance outside Inuyasha's hearing, she stopped and the youkai smiled knowingly at her. "You wish to go home, do you not?"  
  
Kagome nodded. "He'll not know for a while. But it would be best for both of us."  
  
The youkai smiled quietly. "I understand your fear and confusion. To go to one who you do not know who claims to love you, or with one you know, care for, and wish for emptiness but happiness. It is your choice today."  
  
Kagome looked at the youkai and met her eyes fiercely. "You know my answer." The youkai nodded and reached up to her shard. A swift pull ripped it from her head, taking skin and blood with it. She held it, willing her wound to heal, and it did presently. The youkai smiled and shook the skin and blood from it and placed it in Kagome's hand.  
  
"You will not hear more of my people. They respect you for your courage and fire. May you find happiness."  
  
With that, the youkai disappeared into the forest. There was emptiness suddenly, as if a thousand entities left instead of just one. It hit Kagome quickly and she smiled. Never had there been a brother with a love for her. Never had there even been another living. The thousand she felt were memories of past people like her. Her people, the people that lived within her. When she died, she would be another memory in someone else's mind, and she would join her predecessors.  
  
Kagome trudged back to the camp, the shard clutched in her hand. It had a special quality to it that made her smile. It had been a gift. Given of her own free will, and unasked.  
  
She heard the commotion before she was able to see the light in the lightly wooded area. Shippou, Miroku, and Sango were all berating Inuyasha for his foolish choice, but he did not raise his head or a finger to defend himself. He just sat, pain-filled eyes glaring into the fire.  
  
Suddenly, he stood and stalked toward her, hidden in the brush.  
  
"Where are you going?" Sango demanded. "I'm not done talking to you!" Inuyasha spun toward her, his face bitter.  
  
"I'm going to find Kagome!" he shouted and he started walking.  
  
"But you're human, Inuyasha!" Shippou piped. Inuyasha did not stop.  
  
Or at least, he did not stop on account of Shippou's words. Kagome stood up and looked right into his eyes. He stopped short, his eyes wide. She could see a thousand questions run past his eyes, but he did not ask them. His arms wrapped around her, pulling her to his chest as she felt quiet sobs shake his body. His face dug into her neck and he snuffled like a small, hurting puppy. Soothingly, Kagome wrapped her arms around his neck, murmuring encouraging words.  
  
"It's all right, Inuyasha," she murmured.  
  
"No it's not," he grumbled. "I nearly lost you."  
  
"I have her shard," Kagome stated helpfully. Inuyasha smiled against her neck.  
  
"Curse those shards forever and a day. I've got you."  
  
Kagome froze in shock, but he did not seem to notice.  
  
He said nothing more to her of it, but there was that understanding. They shared his words, treasured them, and neither regretted them. The teasing and cursing continued, but without the heart behind it as it once had. She "sat" him less, and he helped her more. Each understood each other, and they shared a secret they even kept from each other.  
  
Someday, some time later, maybe those shards would be cursed, and he would have her.  
  
________________________________________________________________________  
  
Okay, so the ending is inconclusive. Just be glad I could finish it at all with a college level course at my heels and my honors math class on my back. GRRRR!!!! Need claws and fangs!!!!!!!!!!!! RWAR!  
  
Um, I need sugar. I get this way when I don't have sugar. I'll go get some.  
  
Okay, that's all. Just click the button, if it pleases you, and tell me whatcha think. If it totally stinks and is the worst piece of writing you've ever seen, tell me! I'm glad to know if it's bad or not.  
  
~ Kay Kylo 


End file.
